Savannah Guthrie

• 1. Introduction

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  Savannah Guthrie's first television job nearly ended before it began. She started in October 1993 at KTVM, the NBC affiliate in Butte, Montana. On her 10th day at the station, management closed the local news operation. Today she is a main co-anchor of the NBC News morning show Today. How does a reporter whose first newsroom vanished within two weeks end up in that chair? Why did she leave broadcasting to earn a law degree, then turn down a federal clerkship? And what happened in early 2026 that pulled her away from the cameras? The answers start on another continent, long before any studio lights.

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• 2. Born in Melbourne

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  Savannah Clark Guthrie was born on the 27th of December 1971 in Melbourne, Australia. Her father, Charles, was a mining engineer stationed in the city for work. The family lived in the suburb of Beaumaris, and she was named after her great-grandmother. Two years after her birth, the family returned to the United States and settled in Tucson, Arizona.

  Guthrie did not see Australia again until 2015, while she was working for Today. She described the trip as a "lifelong dream." Her mother, Nancy, went with her. They visited Sydney, the Melbourne hospital where Guthrie was born, and the house where the family had lived.

  Back in Tucson, Guthrie graduated from Amphitheater High School. She then attended the University of Arizona, earning a B.A. in journalism and graduating cum laude in 1993. She joined the Arizona Alpha chapter of Pi Beta Phi. That degree set her on a path through a string of local newsrooms.

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• 3. Newsroom to Courtroom

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  After the Montana closure, Guthrie spent two years at KMIZ, the ABC affiliate in Columbia, Missouri. In 1995 she returned to Tucson for a job at KVOA, an NBC affiliate. Five years in Arizona led to WRC-TV, the NBC-owned station in Washington, D.C. There she covered the September 11 attack on the Pentagon and the 2001 anthrax attacks.

  After several years in broadcasting, she chose to go back to school. In 2002 she graduated magna cum laude with a juris doctor from Georgetown University Law Center. According to Washingtonian magazine, she earned the highest score on the Arizona Bar exam in the year she took it. She is a member of the bars of the District of Columbia and Arizona.

  Guthrie also joined the Order of the Coif. She received the International Academy of Trial Lawyers' Student Advocacy award for her work with victims of domestic violence.

  She then worked as a litigation associate at the law firm Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, specializing in white-collar criminal defense. She accepted a clerkship on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Later she turned it down to pursue journalism.

  In 2004 she became a national trial correspondent for CourtTV. Her assignments included the Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearings of Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito. She also covered the abduction and murder trial of Carlie Brucia, the Martha Stewart case, and the Michael Jackson trial. The Jackson trial gave her more than a headline. It also introduced her to a future husband.

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• 4. The Road to Today

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  In September 2007, Guthrie became a correspondent for NBC News, arriving as a legal analyst who regularly reported on trials across the country. During the 2008 campaign she followed Sarah Palin's vice-presidential run through Fairbanks, Pittsburgh, San Antonio, Sioux City, Iowa, and Washington, D.C. On the 18th of December she was named a White House correspondent, a post she held until 2011. She also anchored and substituted on NBC Nightly News.

  In 2010 and 2011 she co-anchored the MSNBC program The Daily Rundown. Meanwhile she filled in on Today for both Meredith Vieira and Ann Curry. Then Vieira announced she was leaving the main co-host seat. Curry was promoted to main co-host and Natalie Morales to news anchor.

  On the 9th of May 2011, it was confirmed that Guthrie would co-host the 9 a.m. hour alongside Morales and Al Roker. She would also serve as the show's chief legal editor. She made her first appearance as NBC News chief legal analyst on the 25th of May 2011. She left The Daily Rundown for Today on the 9th of June 2011.

  On the 29th of June 2012, NBC announced that she would replace Curry as co-anchor of Today. Her first morning alongside Matt Lauer came on the 9th of July 2012. Even before she took that chair, she had begun landing headline interviews.

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• 5. Interviews and Traditions

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  In 2011, Guthrie sat down with Donald Trump to discuss his role in the Barack Obama "birther" controversy. Later that year she interviewed Conrad Murray after he was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter in the death of Michael Jackson. She also reported exclusive details on the death of Osama bin Laden.

  The anchor job brought ceremonial duties as well. Since 2012, Guthrie has hosted NBC's coverage of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. She also hosts the annual Rockefeller Center Christmas tree lighting.

  On the 29th of November 2017, she welcomed Hoda Kotb as co-host. The change followed the public emergence of Lauer's sexual harassment of colleagues. In 2018, Time magazine included Guthrie on its list of the 100 most influential people.

  In October 2020, with the COVID-19 pandemic under way, she interviewed then-President Trump during his re-election campaign. She pressed him on his debts and his response to the pandemic. She also questioned his refusal to condemn the QAnon conspiracy theory. Within months, a very different kind of host's chair would open up for her.

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• 6. Beyond the Desk

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  In February 2021, Guthrie was announced as an interim guest host of Jeopardy! after the death of longtime host Alex Trebek. Her episodes aired from the 14th to the 25th of June 2021.

  She has also written books. Two are children's titles, Princesses Wear Pants and Princesses Save the World. The third is a religious book, Mostly What God Does: Reflections on Seeking and Finding His Love Everywhere.

  On screen, she was a commentator in the first four episodes of season one of truTV Presents: World's Dumbest... She appeared as herself in the 2013 series finale of the NBC sitcom 30 Rock and in the 2015 film Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No! She and Hoda Kotb also turned up in an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm.

  In 2018, she joined the charity exhibition tennis match Match for Africa. Partnering with American pro Jack Sock, she faced Bill Gates and Swiss star Roger Federer. Guthrie and Sock lost, with a final score of 3-6.

  On the 11th of May 2026, NBC announced she would host a new game show called Wordle. Jimmy Fallon will produce it alongside The New York Times, which owns the word puzzle. It is slated to premiere in 2027.

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• 7. Family Life

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  In December 2005, Guthrie married Mark Orchard, an English-born BBC News presenter. The couple divorced in January 2009. Later that year, while vacationing in the Turks and Caicos Islands, she began a relationship with Michael Feldman, a Democratic political and communications consultant.

  They became engaged in 2013. They married on the 15th of March 2014 in Tucson, Arizona. Two days later, Guthrie announced that she was four months pregnant. In August 2014 she gave birth to their first child, a daughter named Vale.

  On the 7th of June 2016, she announced that she and her husband were expecting again. Their second child, a son, was born later in 2016. They named him Charles, after her father. According to Guthrie, he was conceived through in-vitro fertilization.

  Her father had died unexpectedly in 1988, on a mining exploration in Mexico. The family's hardest test, however, was still ahead, in the winter of 2026.

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• 8. A Hard Winter

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  In January 2026, Guthrie had surgery on her vocal cords to remove nodules and a polyp. She took a brief hiatus from Today to recover and returned later that month.

  On the 1st of February 2026, the Pima County Sheriff's Department reported that her mother, Nancy Guthrie, was missing. Nancy had last been seen on the 31st of January 2026. Authorities are treating her disappearance as a crime, and it drew national attention.

  Guthrie stepped away from NBC to help with the search. That included giving up her role co-hosting the opening ceremonies of the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy.

  On the 27th of March 2026, she announced that she would return to Today on the 6th of April 2026. That date ended a two-month hiatus and brought her back to NBC News.

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